Why do mods have the power to pull stunts as described in here and specifically here? This isn't just "witch-hunting", I would appreciate an honest answer for a serious concern. Though I will probably just get banned for bring it up at this rate.

This is witch hunting, though. If the users in questions had legitimate reason to believe the mods of /r/politics were engaged in shady behavior, manipulation of reddit, or otherwise abusing their position for personal financial gain, they should have gone directly to the admins with their, not running screaming around reddit to every sub that would host their post. All that does is get people riled up with nothing more than conjecture and circumstantial evidence. But we all know that's enough to condemn someone as guilty in the Reddit Court of Public Opinion.

This is the reason new subreddits are so easy to create. I can create one easier than I can finish this comment. It's so that if you don't like one subreddit and think you can do better, you have every opportunity to try. This competition is supposed to keep subreddits and their moderators on their A-game, because while they are masters of their domain, a new one can quite easily rise up and take it's place.

And the mods are masters of their domains. They can run their subreddit however they want, ban anyone they want for any reason they want. And what harm is really done by that? It's not like that's the only subreddit that will ever be in existence, or the only place to ever find that content on the internet. Get over it. You wanna get back at them, treat it like the business world, and build a better subreddit to laud over them. Speaking of business, that leads me to my next point.

The admins don't really care about mod drama. They have a business to run. If they don't focus on the business, we don't have a site to enjoy. Until their business is threatened, and their jobs are threatened, there's no need for them to get involved. Subreddits come and go, that's the nature and identity of reddit, so there's not 'integrity of the site' to preserve in the admins propping up certain subs. Yes, it's nice when they help out in places like /r/iama, where traffic helps the whole site. This is not the case with /r/politics.

Everyone knows that place is a cesspool anyways, so what's the big fucking deal? Make a better one, obviously it can't be that hard. Especially not with this many people pissed off about it, you'd think support and new subscribers would be plentiful. They're just joining the lynch mob, though. They'd rather raise hell than put in the legwork and make an acceptable replacement.

I've been around a while and seen my share of witch hunts. They're all ridiculous, and usually blow over in a few days anyways. It's a bunch of ill-informed users, who mistakenly think they're entitled to something on their free website, and get offended when someone doesn't meet their expectations. Then, since their only other option is to just ignore the site, they raise hell and try to bully change to come by these lynch mobs, stalking and harassing users in question, even going as far as doxxing and threatening to spill this over into the real world. And for what? Some slight offense on a website that has more cat pictures and boob pics than it does legitimate educational or informative links? For a disagreement about the operation of a forum they know nothing about and use for free?

Yes, when the ire of the mob is turned on some people, they respond poorly. Other times, people are too caught up in their own asses and taking this site so seriously to see how much it ultimately matters--none. Whether davidreiss666 and the rest of the crew are shills is a trivial matter. That issue should have been handled by compiling the evidence and quietly and professionally taking it to the admins, the only people on the site with a vested interest in seeing it resolved. Furthermore, the post to /r/bestof was not in any way a proper /r/bestof submission. Or at least, not what /r/bestof used to be. Now it's filled with any highly-voted dick joke, tinfoil hat theory, or well-timed pun from a novelty account. The integrity of that sub is quickly approaching that of /r/funny or /r/politics, and submitting which hunts and trying to expose great reddit conspiracies only contributes further to it.

It's scary how seriously people take this site, but it's even more sad the lengths people go to for 'justice' over something that is not worth your time to begin with.

I just want to say that despite any difference of opinions that may occur, I do genuinely appreciate your thoughtful response, but I would like to address a few things.

First, I feel that there was a legitimate reason to bring up what he did and while you may call it witch hunting, every investigation technically starts as what you refer to as a "witch hunt" because there is always a period where it starts as a mere suspicion and evolves given time and evidence.

With that said, I do agree with you that going to an admin would be the right step to take initially as opposed to making it public as they can. However, from what I gathered, admins basically shot everything down due to a lack of direct evidence as well as that like you said, they do not get caught up in mod drama.

Herein lies the problem. Just because he doesn't have direct evidence doesn't mean he is wrong about his accusations. Though it could also mean he is. While that kind of logic would certainly never convict anyone in a court of law, it should absolutely open the door to a free discussion. That is the purpose of a website like reddit; discussion. My point is that if people want to discuss these potential instances, it is somewhat of an abuse of power for mods to straight up remove every single comment or post having to deal with these instances; it stinks of a cover up. I know mods are busy and some have to deal with thousands or even millions of subscribers, but if an instance like this pops up, a rational and just mod should take the time to defend himself against accusations in said thread, not take the draconian measure of nuking every single comment that so much as hints against him.

And yes, I am aware that anybody can easily make a new subreddit and that mods are the "masters of their domain", but should they be? A site like reddit is meant for the individual reader and shouldn't be dictated by the imposed will of a select few. Mods should facilitate the flow of content within their subreddit as dictated by the majority; the individual submissions that contribute to the site. Mods should not disturb the free flow of information except for extremes such as user abuse (pointing out potential institution corruption is certainly not abuse).

What you say about the admins even makes it seem like they do not have a good sense of institutional control. I am not alleging that all admins or mods are like this, but if an individual takes on the responsibility of administrating a website like reddit, it is absolutely their job to monitor the performance of those under them. You say this is a business, but in a real business, the head managers would clearly hold those under them who make mistakes accountable for their actions. And if something is alleged against them, it is absolutely their job to get to the bottom of it. You may say that the admins don't have time to do such things like that, but that is part of the job. If you don't like it, a person shouldn't take that job then. And if they do, then suck it up and do your job.

And while you have seen your fair share of witch hunts, you may be right that many of them are ridiculous and over the top, but haven't you ever stopped to think that maybe one of them may have been right? People are still human and make mistakes from time to time and it only makes sense that a mod here or there has slipped up and made a mistake that was unjustified. From all of the unjust things I have seen mods do, I have literally never seen one held accountable for their actions.

It's funny that you say that people take this site too seriously, to that, I would just point out this exact instance, but not to the users complaining; to the mods. If you say people calling out potential corruption is taking it too seriously, isn't taking totalitarian control and deleting content at will taking it too seriously? I would even argue making sub rules and making people abide by them is "taking it too seriously" if you want to go by that logic. But that is unreasonable, obviously the site does need rules here and there and it makes sense to take it seriously in both instances, so don't try to patronize my legitimate concerns, I do not appreciate that. But hey, I guess I'm just some asshole taking it too seriously, right?

At the end of the day, it shouldn't be up to a select few to force the hands of the millions of individuals that use this site. If content is generating interest and generating views, it shouldn't be mothballed by the mods, it should be up to the democratic majority of the people to vote on a simple site like this. If people feel a post doesn't belong, then let the people downvote it as a whole, don't let one sour individual ruin the fun of the site for the rest of the people.

And yes, you will say that if we don't like it, then we should just go and make our own. But therein lies another problem. What about the subs that are defaults? Those won't go away and are clearly emphasized over the rest of them. Yes there is the example of /r/trees being a successful spin-off, but neither was a default. It is for this reason why something like /r/news would have difficulty attaining the following of /r/worldnews even though it avoids most of the bias within that sub (for example, internal US news is most certainly world news to an individual from Canada or the UK).

And for the record, I am a mod on some smaller subs and I do know that it can be important for an individual such as one of us to have some control over what goes it so you can prevent abuse. My question is where is the line between protecting the integrity of the sub and merely taking away freedoms. My question is where is the line where people take their power too far. My question is why nothing happens to the people that abuse their power and why is every single alternative you suggest shifting blame away from those in power. People like me may not be right every time about such accusations, but you can't just keep shoving us aside like the boy who cried wolf. These are real concerns from real people about real problems, and yet, all you give me are fake resolutions. When and where does this huge circlejerk end? From what I've read and seen, I'm afraid I already know the answer to that...

I'm not trying to direct my exasperation or frustration direction at you for your stance or asking this question. This whole thing just blows my mind and gets me riled up.

If the admins shoot it down, that's their prerogative. This is their site. But since nobody but the admins can view the details behind each poster, their IP addresses, details about submissions trends, they're the ones you'll want investigating it. And showing up on their doorstep with a lynch mob at your back asking them to help you is not an effective way to be heard or taken seriously.

There are ample meta subreddits, theory-of subreddits, self and miscellanious subreddits where a discussion can be had, but it's imperative that it needs to be discussion, and not accusations.

I would absolutely say the mods have every right to exert whatever degree of authority over the content of their subs as they see fit. Many of them are the original creators, and are completely justified in allowing or disallowing any content they wish. The rest have been selected by those creators to carry the subreddit by the established standards. But here we see the two primary schools of moderation, active and passive. Active mods will be the initiators and facilitators of change and content, directly managing it. Passive mods will allow their users to dictate the content and direction. Neither one is necessarily more right than the other, but everyone needs to be aware of these two styles and accept them. But the subs essentially belong to the mods, reddit is just the host, and the users are completely voluntary.

Regarding the admins, I can't speak for them, just rely my interpretation of what they've already said about similar matters. But the tradition of reddit is that the admins don't exercise institutional control. And their primary duties is not to monitor the minutiae of moderators and their actions, but to ensure that the site continues to grow subscribers and ensure they raise an appropriate amount of revenue to keep the infrastructure up to the traffic capacity. This is especially hard for them when you see reddit's population double in the least ~year. But it obviously means the existing practice of liassez faire subreddit creation and moderation is working, since new users are coming in droves. If moderators were paid, you might have a case, but they are volunteers and reddit is a pet-project and side job for most of the admins. The funds aren't there because redditors don't want to pay for the site.

And in what way would you 'hold someone accountable' for which actions? Just because it's not publicized as an official scolding, or announced in a press release by the admins, does not mean things aren't happening. They don't have to make everything our business, because its not our business. It's their business, this is just what we do for leisure.

Calling out abusing reddit and manipulating the workings of reddit for another user's personal gain is important. But in what way is deleting illegal posts on a subreddit 'corruption?' What's lost by this, who is harmed by this? Not a single person on the site can legitimately say they suffered legitimate harm from the actions that occurred, other than the admins. So when people make it a personal affair, it's completely unfounded.

At the end of the day, it's always the case that a select few control and dictate the content, flow, and communication on a website. Any website. Popularity should not be, nor does it have to be, the biggest factor dictating what and how content is shared on reddit. If that were the case, /r/askreddit would be memems and rage comics and porn, because those are all popular, right?

The default subs are not set in stone. They are merely the top-performing subs as they currently exist, and they can be replaced. There is tremendous argument as to which subreddits should be defaults, if it should be the most popular(as is reddit tradition), or if the admins should be a rounded balance of top subs to welcome new users. Yes, it is hard for a new subreddit to claim the spot of a default. But it can be done. I believe it happened with /r/askscience, which subsequently rejected its 'default' status, if my memory serves me correct. Big events like this facilitate the growth of spinoff subs. Hell, when it happened to Digg, it was the best thing that happened to reddit in terms of growth. Fill a niche, appeal to your users, and success will come. It would be counter to the ideology of reddit for the admins to meticulously manage the subreddits for maximum profitability, when an there's an equally as viable option in allowing and encouraging users to build a better mouse trap, so to speak.

We have different philosophies on this, brought by different beliefs, understandings and experiences on this site. I want to reiterate that I'm not trying to belittle or dismiss you, though it probably comes off like that at times. I see our views as reflecting the two camps: You looking to your idea of what reddit could be, and entrusting the users to be the stewards of the subs; and I upholding the status quo, as it were, where the mods are the directors of the subreddits, and by subscribing and participating in the subs the users agree to adhere to the moderators rules and practices. It's a 'right to participate' agreement, and if the users walk away, they take a certain degree of the moderators' authority with them, but in staying they give it.

These two stances often cause a schism that spills into reddit and takes on a force of its own. Moderators, at times, are even aggressively persecuted on what a large portion of the population would say are baseless claims and feigned transgressions. But a diplomatic and professional approach is what is needed to resolve these conflicts. Trying to damage a user or topple a staple community of the site in a fit of passion will only do more harm to reddit. Ultimately I believe that it's going to be another witch-hunt that does reddit in, just like has happened with countless subreddits and other communities around the web.

Once again, I appreciate you taking the time to fully answer and address everything I asked with a level head, discussions like this can often get heated and I am glad we could each maintain some semblance of rationality and objectivity.

I also feel you did a great job explaining your point of view and how it differed between mine and I suppose in this case all we can do is agree to disagree. You're right, we both hold different philosophies on the site, although I wouldn't necessarily say that my views are completely opposed to yours. While there are some things that I feel should be different, I actually do feel that having active mods as opposed to completely passive mods is beneficial. With that said, I would personally favor a more balanced approach between the two philosophies. I feel users absolutely deserve a say in at least some matters, especially those who are frequent contributors to a sub. I still feel it is a bit totalitarian for a group of 5-10 individuals dictating the content for a sub that has thousands to millions of people. For instance, they could make a rule drastically changing the nature of a sub overnight and they would face little opposition in terms of control. Sure people can petition or leave, but it is unlikely that it will result in any actual change. That's why I feel that there should be more checks and balances for some of the powers that these active mods have.

For instance, I will give you an actual example illustrating what happened to a sub I used to be a part of. It had around 10 mods and about 6,000 subscribers as well as a fairly active community. However, the mods (in this case, none of whom were actual contributors, at least towards the end of the sub) decided that "it had gone on long enough" and decided to set the entire sub to private overnight, available to nobody. In this case, we actually followed the advice you laid out and created an alternate sub, but the problem was that not all of those contributors would necessarily know how to get to the new one, and the mods actively robbed the enjoyment of however many active individuals were a part of that community for what essentially amounts to their own selfish motives. Now if you say that is their right since they are the mods of it, I would contend if they were tired of moderating that they instead should have stepped down and let somebody else moderate. However, they didn't do that, they just mothballed the entire sub and ruined it for everybody. It is this kind of abuse of power that endlessly frustrates me, and that combined with everything that just happened that I already mentioned is what motivated me to post here.

Now I tried to have rational conversation with each and every mod about it, but they all either ignored me, brashly told me off, or for the few ones that actually took their time to give a reasonable response, gave fairly ambiguous reasons with no follow up. And not to rustle any jimmies after having a nice civilized discussion to this point, but I would like to add that two of the mods here were actually mods on that sub I just described to you, the individuals being /u/HandicapperGeneral and /u/snarkypants (not witch hunting because 1. this is something that definitely happened in reality and 2. because I am not going after them or anything, just trying to get some perspective in here). So I suppose you can see why I am so weary with these circumstances.

I understand, I definitely would be pretty peeved too. Ideally there would be more accountability. In theory, the accountability the mods have towards the users comes in the understanding that when they screw up the subreddit will suffer. In reality, it means precisely dick. Unfortunately some people are just bastards, and don't take as much pride in their work as others, and then that kind of stuff happens. It's definitely shitty.

But the users need to also accept accountability for their own actions, agree to follow the rules as set forth in the subreddit or petition to change them through reasonable and professional means. Not with a angry coup, which is all to often the case. Because then shit blows up, the rift grows, and resentment builds.

As often as this happens, and it is indeed very often, neither side learns anything from it. There remains a certain level of distrust and contention between many moderators and users(and users and users, and mods and mods), typically because it has escalated almost to a point of mutually assured destruction. Only problem is, there's a slight imbalance in ultimate power. For the most part, the mods can only shut down a subreddit, ban a few users, and delete a few posts. Those offended users, however, will often go entirely too far in their persecution of a mod, threatening them with real life consequences that extend beyond the virtual realm of reddit. And that is the biggest problem here. Flame wars escalate beyond control and an angry mob has more resources at their disposal and more clouded judgment when they use it than they ever should. And that's why they need to be shut down before they can spin out of control, before drastic damage can be done for an ultimately trivial offense.

Instead of either party trying to bluntly impose their will on the other, it would be wonderful to collaborate together to create something worth having and worth preserving. In order to do this, each side needs to realize they are entitled to very little from the other in this relationship. Irresponsible people ultimately get their comeuppance, it needn't come in such an ugly and harmful way.

It's simple, make your own subreddit. It's free site that you willingly subscribe to, nobody owes the user anything.

And the admins will get involved, provided there is a reasonable case and real evidence brought to them. Conjecture fueled by a lynch mob obscures and dilutes that evidence and destroys any credibility.

It's free to access the site, so no one owes you, personally anything. The site has improved and given things to users because it owes the users its existence. That's why we have updates, servers, etc., and that's all it owes its userbase. Free users, free site, free to leave, and so on.

The thing is, the original bestof thread wasn't about any mods at all. All it said was that the top submitters to politics submit the majority of the content and that the content they submit is biased. That's literally all it said, no one accused any mods of anything until the thread started being deleted. Then someone pointed out that dr666 was a mod in both bestof and politics and that's when it exploded.

edit: on the easy to create a new sub note, I made /r/micromod and you can post whatever you want there.

In any event, it wasn't /r/bestof material, but rather /r/karmaconspiracy or any other number of subs. And then when it turned ugly, it got out of hand real quick. It's safe to say that it was handled poorly on both sides, nobody is faultless here, but the ensuing shitstorm wants to paint only dr666 and the rest as the ones acting out of line.

Nah, it was removed shortly after, causing a whole new outcry and earning a post in SRD.

Exactly, and /r/trees is seeing huge success now. The /r/games and /r/gaming thing, as well, not to mention the rise and success of of the SFWporn picture network, and the slew of news or politics subs.

This competition is supposed to keep subreddits and their moderators on their A-game, because while they are masters of their domain, a new one can quite easily rise up and take it's place.

Perfect example: /r/trees. The original choof subreddit went to shit with the mods getting stricter and stricter, so other subreddits popped up. /r/trees gained the most following, and is now the premier marijuana subreddit, with hundreds of thousands of subscribers.

I am of the opinion that strict moderation is necessary to maintain subreddit quality in most cases. That doesn't make you a "shit mod."
/r/trees is a perfect example of this; it's unreadable because it's a free-for-all. If I remember correctly, /r/marijuana died because of racism, not strict moderation.

Previously our answer to someone complaining about moderation was to tell them to just set up their own reddit, moderate it however they like, and if they do a better job, people will use their reddit instead.

That however doesn't work quite as well anymore, because it would be hard to establish a new reddit that covers the same topics as a top 10 reddit and actually replace it.

What a load of bullshit. Its matter of importance because default subs affect what new users are exposed to. Most people who go to reddit are lurkers oblivious to hwo the sub sytem even works. Its spam and nothing else. Stop defending it.

Why do they have the ability to remove posts and ban users? Because... that's one of the primary roles of a moderator. I seriously don't get why you're asking this. It's like asking you why are you able to post links.

Moderators can run their subreddits however they please. Don't like it? Create your own to compete with it, and then spend hundreds or thousands of unpaid hours building and maintaining it.

If you create a subreddit, it's yours and you can do whatever you want with it. That's how it works. This latest round of moderator witch hunts in /r/politics and /r/worldnews needs to stop.

You can say that it isn't a witch hunt, but that's exactly what it is. We have seen them before. They are perpetrated by people who just don't understand how reddit works.

Edit: I personally have wondered whether davidreiss666 was being compensated for his submissions. If the admins find evidence of that, they will presumably ban him. That has been done in the past, though I don't remember the power user's username at the moment. Also, davidreiss666 is active on /r/reportthespammers, so it is doubtful that he is a spammer himself.

Edit 2: I am on my phone and accidentally deleted the part about the amazon affiliate spammer who created subreddits to spam affiliate links to and the admins have told me will be allowed to do his thing.

You're fucked if you do and fucked if you don't. I've only got ~25,000 people to worry about, and most of them actually like me, but 3.5 million? I'm guessing there's more than a few out there who don't like you lot

Probably. I don't really care. I aim to carry myself with at least some level of professionalism in my mod duties, that's all they need to worry about. And frankly it would be nice to be able to trust them to do the same. Apparently it's a one way street though.

"But...but freedom of speech man! You're infringing on our rights!" Actually no, I'm infringing on your privilege. I can remove everything you post, I can ban you, but no, I'm taking up my free time to explain to you how your post would be better served somewhere else, how you're being unfair to other users, all in all trying to make this place better for you. But nah, you're right, I can see how that makes me a cunt.

Moderating is a thankless job, and it makes me angry to see these mods being harassed. You can't please everyone, especially when a large userbase is involved.

I moderate /r/tattoos, and we strictly enforce our rules. When a post hits the front page of /r/all, the enforcement of those rules can result in a backlash, hatemail, and even the occasional stalker. I can't imagine how obnoxious it must be to moderate a default subreddit.

It's not easy. There's no way to please everyone, but hopefully you are selected as a mod because of your ability to uphold certain standards for the subreddit, and keep it appealing to the maximum number of users while not letting it devolve to the lowest common denominator.

The average user really doesn't know how much work, effort, and teamwork is put into effectively moderating a large subreddit. It's a lot. And good mod teams will stay in constant communication and try to keep up with an evolving subreddit, all without becoming overbearing or overly influential on the sub. We're human, so mistakes will happen, and a little bit of slack would be nice when we do screw up. But try helping to make our jobs easier, not harder, and then your complaints might be valid if someone drops the ball.

The impression I've gotten is that they're basically indifferent to that amazon stuff as long as it stays confined to one subreddit. Could it be shown to be a widespread thing involving many large subreddits, I imagine the reaction would be different.

I agree with everyone here in saying that mods have control over their subreddit, but I want to add that most people don't seem to realize how much mods really do. Take away the mods of a default and watch things go fucking crazy. I believe F7U12 did that at one point and it just degenerated so quickly. Rules are in place to keep things together.

TL;DR It's a free site. Don't like it or parts of it? Leave it (or parts of it).

I want to believe that the userbase would be responsible in a time like, and in certain cases they would be (people like me who actually care about the rules would try and keep order), but there'd be too much. Shitheads would flood /new with pointless bullshit just because they could, other shitheads would upvote just because they could etc etc. Could you imagine the modqueue the day after?

This is not a matter of people breaking the rules in the absence of mods, but rather the mods letting their "power" get to their heads and trying to direct the aim of a particular subreddit to fit their individual beliefs.

But that's just it, the subreddit should be fitting of their particular beliefs. Someone created the subreddit with something in mind and appointed mods to uphold that. So long as all the mods agree, the subreddit should go towards their beliefs/interests. They have total power, and so does anyone else who creates a subreddit.

Technically it's about whatever the mods decide it's about. I agree that if the mods decide it is a place for open discussion they should not be removing opposing posts, but as it stands, if the mods have shaped the subreddit a certain way, it is their choice to make, and others can just as easily create a competing subreddit.

I would agree that most of the default subs have a certain culture that users learn about very quickly. /r/Askreddit and /r/politics have completely different users bases and it shows. Yes one is comment based and the other link based, but the discussions are what make a sub.

These subreddits have these reputations because of the mods choices in how to run them. The fairly recent change in Askreddit about putting your own story into a comment is an example. Compare your subreddit and /r/atheism and the contrast is startling. Why? Mod choices.

Really, the lazzie faire attitude of this site should be a libertarians dream with the best idea making it to the top with almost no intervention by the admins.

That isn't how reddit works. Reddit is a platform, you can make a subreddit and mod it however you want, you can form a clique of buddies and make your own private subreddit where you can plot your subreddit private. You can meet on IRC and talk about bans and deleting posts and you can block access to your subreddits moderation logs. This isn't anything new. I've been on reddit for 6 years, its been like this for at least the past 4.

Essentially both the users and the admins on reddit have the freedom to use it however they want so long as they don't break the law and don't violate the user agreement.